In Ljubljana, DCAF (Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces) organized a five-day seminar and exchange of experiences on effective oversight systems of security and intelligence agencies in the Western Balkan countries and individual Western European countries (Belgium, the Netherlands, Norway). In addition to discussing positive and negative experiences in each participating country, the primary goal was to provide members of the Kosovo Parliament with the widest possible insight into the issue so that they could create their own model of effective oversight. Their delegation was therefore, of course, the largest. In addition to the members of the Agency Oversight Committee, the Chair of the Committee on Human Rights, Gender Equality, Missing Persons and Petitions, the Chair of the Committee on Rights, Interests of Communities and Returns, the Director General of the Kosovo Intelligence Agency, the Auditor General, and several employees of the Parliament and various state institutions arrived from Kosovo.
The hosts presented their surveillance system and allowed the participants to visit important institutions – the Ministry of the Interior, the Parliament and the Security and Intelligence Agency SOVA itself. Presentations were given by Pavel Gantar, former President of the Parliament of Slovenia, Andrej Rupnik, former Director of SOVA-eJurij Ferme, Director of the Police Criminal Investigation Department, Igor Šoltes, President of the Court of Auditors of Slovenia and several members of parliament.
The exchange of experiences showed that each country must devise mechanisms appropriate to its own context, but the only important thing everywhere is to enable the established body to operate and supervise without interference from political vested interests. The existing and presented models (Netherlands, Norway, Belgium, Croatia, Slovenia) show the diversity of the ways in which the agencies themselves and independent oversight bodies are established and function, but what should be common to all of them is that they take their work very seriously, that there is no party competition or "shooting" during oversight, and that parliaments consider their annual reports very seriously. The oversight of telecommunications and the financial operations of agencies was discussed in particular. Despite the need to keep some data as highly confidential (names of agents and operations), it is important to monitor how and on what budget funds are actually spent.
With the unstoppable development of information and telecommunications technologies, the work of supervision is becoming more and more complex, and in fact all existing supervisors had to admit that they certainly do not have and will never have insight into everything that happens in their countries regarding security-intelligence activities, but supervision is necessary because it still limits the power of agencies that, through their actions, very often actually enter the area of violations of fundamental human rights. Although they are legally allowed to do so, strict care should be taken to ensure that they do not exceed the limits of their authority as little as possible.
There are very few women in leading positions in the security and intelligence system and in oversight bodies, because it is still traditionally believed that security and intelligence work is a male task and part of male "nature", but DCAF is also emancipating itself and for the second time insists on the arrival and presentations of Sanja Sarnavka, president of the Board of Directors of the House of Human Rights and member of the Council for Civilian Oversight of Security and Intelligence Agencies, who presented the oversight system in Croatia and the legal powers of the body of which she is a member.
The meetings continue.
